EDITORIAL: Remains don't merit rest at the landfill

One of the many attributes that speak so well of the American military is the care it takes in providing for final interment. The great military cemeteries are testament to that care and pride.

Somehow, however, the military mortuary at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware has been dogged by a series of mishandled human remains.

The initial scandal was that, between 2003 and 2008, unclaimed or unidentified body parts of the victims of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars were cremated. Those remains went to a contractor who mixed in biomedical waste and incinerated the mixture. The remainder was dumped in a landfill.

That's awful.

News accounts say the practice was stopped in 2008 in favor of burying the ashes at sea.

Now comes the disclosure that the partial remains of 9/11 victims at the Pentagon and near Shanksville, Pa., were also sent to a landfill.

The chain of custody seems to be confused. The Somerset County coroner said unidentified remains from Shanksville were buried at the memorial site.

But some material, most likely from the Pentagon site, that could not be tested or identified was disposed of in a landfill.

The military's mortuary attendants have a grisly, though necessary, job and one can understand why they just want to hurry up and be done with it.

There must be a solution both dignified and respectful. A landfill isn't it.